


Open Seams

by auraofdawn



Category: Devil May Cry
Genre: Accidental Bonding, Dadgil Week (Devil May Cry), F/M, Family Fluff, Father-Son Relationship, Gen, One Shot, Post-Canon, Sewing
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-27
Updated: 2020-06-27
Packaged: 2021-03-04 05:55:00
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,537
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24938638
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/auraofdawn/pseuds/auraofdawn
Summary: A tattered jacket, a slow afternoon, and a wave of guilt all combine to drive Nero towards a challenge he has yet to conquer: learning to sew. With needle in hand and his father at his side, he ventures forth.
Relationships: Kyrie/Nero (Devil May Cry), Nero & Vergil (Devil May Cry)
Comments: 17
Kudos: 105





	Open Seams

Kyrie is Nero's savior in many things, but even she cannot save him from everything. _Especially_ not all the chores. He always feels a pang of guilt in his very soul whenever he catches sight of her scurrying around town or house, selflessly giving herself up for the convenience of others with or without repayment. Sometimes Nero thinks he shouldn't even charge people for his own demon-hunting services, but that all stops when he's forced to take a look at their tiny savings. 

After that, he always feels like he has to do _something_ , just to take the load off her, and to make himself useful between jobs. After all, demon hunting wasn't always going to be needed, but food and laundry and babysitting? That was always in demand. 

Usually, he offers to do anything she needs, but today it's all done. Kyrie announces that she's been called to help with something at the orphanage, and won't be able to get to mending the latest tears in his jacket today. 

"Don't worry about it," he tells her, because he doesn't mind wearing torn clothes any more than she does. He honestly preferred it at this point, and it wasn't like their closets were getting fancier any time soon. Not like any of it would make a difference on their already-shitty reputation in town. 

But the more he looks at the poor thing—ripped asunder by a particularly ferocious fury who just. Wouldn't. Fucking. _Die_ —the worse he feels. If it were any other coat he wouldn't give a shit, but this was her gift to him, way back when Dante had first given him the Devil May Cry sign. It had been the biggest one-two boost to his self-confidence—a brand from his now-uncle, a new look from the love of his life—because they believed in his abilities, and if that wasn't enough, then what would be? 

Now the coat just sits there, abandoned on Kyrie's sewing desk, and Nero grits his teeth. 

He can do this. How hard can sewing a few tears be? 

* * *

An hour lost, and its looking pretty bad. 

For one, he hasn't even really started, unless accidentally making the tears bigger counted for something, which, for all he knew about sewing, could have been true. 

It would help if he could actually figure out how to turn the sewing machine on. He's checked the plug and wiring time and time again, stomped on the pedal thing below, and poked the needle enough times to make sure it was... a needle! All he could succeed in doing was making the mechanism go up and down, but without any stitches or marks left in the damn fabric! What did he have to do to the damn thing, enter a password? Find a missing part? It was ridiculous! 

A thick huff entered his lungs and wound his shoulders up like a music box. This was so stupid. Why in hell did he think he could master an art that girls like Kyrie spent years learning? All the nuns at the orphanage made it look so easy, they always demanded he recognize how hard they worked to mend every pair of pants he'd shredded as a kid, and yet he kept at it anyway. 

His head and hands are definitely getting hotter the more he stews, and yet, a wave of cold threatens to thrash over him. Suddenly, like a chill, but familiar like a breeze. 

"The needle isn't threaded." 

Nero whipped around, his right hand flying out and glowing with power, while the left held onto his coat for dear life. 

He was faced with none other than his father, frowning and stone-like as always. 

"You can say hi," Nero deadpanned, "y'know, like a normal-ass father." 

Said father remained still. 

"If you're lookin' for a spar, you picked a bad time—I'm busy with this." 

Vergil leaned over to investigate the jacket, frayed and splayed out over Nero's lap for all to see. 

"Ah," he tutted. 

"Unless you're gonna help, back up," Nero nudged him away, "this stuff is delicate and I need all the space I can get." 

But his father remained hovering, eyes following Nero's clumsy hands as he struggled to situate the fabric in a way that wouldn't let it slip off the table anymore. But this shit was just so damn heavy—who knew his jacket was like this? He would have never worn one if he'd known it would be so damn _neurotic_. 

Fed up and clueless, Nero just dropped his hands into his lap. 

"You shouldn't do that section by hand," Vergil said. 

"What?" 

"It's a lining seam; you have to turn the whole thing inside out and sew it there," he pointed like it was the most obvious thing in the world. 

"You know how to sew?" Nero gaped. 

"Mending is a vital survival skill too many humans overlook," Vergil confirmed. He held his arms out and his flawless coat draped down, its delicate velvet and intricate embroidery a flawless shape in the afternoon light. "My mother was quite meticulous with it, as well." 

_Oh_ , the revelation hits Nero like a blade to the chest. This was his orphaned father, survivor of countless demonic hordes as a child, with nothing but a blade and the clothes on his back. So of course, when those clothes had needed patching and tailoring, who else to do it but himself? There was no one else. 

And here Nero was, only doing it because his lovely girlfriend couldn't get to it first. 

He's actually a piece of shit sometimes. 

"Well," Nero scratched the back of his head awkwardly and leaned back, offering his dad all the space he would take. "Where do we start?" 

* * *

Sewing, as Nero learned, was actually satisfying as hell. But it's also probably the hardest thing he's attempted to learn since swordfighting, and his father is keen to inform him that he still has a long way to go on both. 

Vergil started him on button sewing—which he gawked at because his jacket doesn't _have_ any buttons, dumbass—but his father is quick to point out that the clasps are loose and could do with tightening, something simple enough for any beginner to handle. And as much as Nero wanted to scoff and glower at being called a beginner at anything, his ego is not _that_ delicate, and he genuinely wants to learn. So he sits back, watches in relative horror as Vergil rips off a sliver clasp, and then reattaches it with a few steady stitches. Some strong yanks later and Nero saw in awe as the thing couldn't be budged, alongside the pride evident on his father' own face. 

"Okay," he gaped, and accepted the bunched-up jacket with a second clasp. 

If anything, however, it gives Nero too much hope. What had taken his father mere minutes takes over an hour for his own attempt; countless minutes lost to pricking a finger or searching in vain for a lost thread. The number of times Vergil sighed pointedly piled up too much for his liking, and he'd come close to blowing up more than once. The first time he even got it attached, it looked so lopsided and haphazard he just wanted to rip it out—but who knew even _that_ could be done wrong? Vergil stole the jacket back to slide a small summoned sword through the thread, deft movement slicing through thick knots that Nero couldn't fathom ever creating with his slow-ass stitches. 

Nonetheless, the machine does not make him any more optimistic. 

"You have the wrong foot for this fabric," Vergil murmured as he beheld the leather lining. 

Nero raised an eyebrow. "A foot?" 

Vergil pointed at the metal mechanism that covered the needle. "This; you need a walking foot in order to handle the texture on this quilting." 

"What the hell is that?!" 

Vergil could only sigh as he dragged his hand down his face. 

Nero could do without the terminology—just tell him to put the needle in the jacket and put his foot on the motor thing and he can _go_ —terms were just silly words and he didn't need to know _everything_ . It takes his father several reminders to get this through his head, just as Nero needs to unstitch and redo the same simple section _three_ times. 

"I got it!" Nero yells out, raising the jacket victoriously. 

Vergil's head pokes out from behind a ream of fabric. "Did you take all the pins out? 

"Yeah." 

"Did you get all around the zipper?" 

"Yup." 

"Did you remember to back stitch?" 

"Yes!" 

Vergil finally hovered over to the machine, his hands light and open on the jacket as Nero was totally not holding his breath, his nerves waiting for the inevitable redo. 

"Ah," his father tutted so quietly, Nero strained to hear, "that will do." 

"Really?" 

The dark slayer himself nodded, smoothing the seam down and folding it up, holding it out for his son. 

Nero snatched it up and shook it out, all the torn seams and dangling threads gone, replaced by new, clean stitches and smoothed wrinkles. 

"Is that all?" Vergil asked, eyes scanning the room. His fingers drummed against the sewing desk, hands and eyes hungry for another challenge. 

Nero followed, but it only led him to be lost again amongst the piles of scrap and baskets of clothes in various states. This was entirely Kyrie's space, and yet he felt so unfamiliar with all of it, almost unwelcome. She'd surely have his head for even thinking such a thing, but that didn't change the facts. Kyrie was the only reason he even had any remotely nice clothes, but she was simultaneously why he had to wear them until they were threadbare—she just never had enough time to finish much beyond the kids. And always last on the list, he never failed to notice, was herself. It ached him almost as much a simply leaving her to go work, evermore because he was powerless to help unless he made more money... 

With a light and nervous hand, he approached a basket of clothes that looked bigger than the rest, which were all assuredly children's clothes. Kyrie made plenty of everything for everyone but herself, and it was no wonder why. But it was far past time someone do the same for her. 

"I can think of a few more projects." 

* * *

"I have not worked with women's patterns _specifically_ ," Vergil warned, a lit in his voice that nearly made Nero stumble over a basket, "but they should present a welcome challenge." 

Nero scoffed and let himself fall onto the ground, burying himself in a pile of fabric. "There's no winning in this, just finishing a thing." 

"Such is my aim," his father replied. 

Another eye roll and he went back to sorting through fabric. Would a print work nicely enough? Didn't Kyrie prefer flat colors? But what about knits? He barely knew the names of all the styles and weaves, but decision evaded him. Kyrie looked beautiful in anything, he'd be the first to admit that, but this had to be special, for her. 

It had to be _perfect_. 

He leaned back and found a remarkable lack of support in a stacked tower of baskets that fell over in his wake. The commotion roused Vergil enough to turn and raise an eyebrow, which his son deflected with a raised finger of his own. 

"What is her size?" 

"What?" Nero leapt up and charged at his father with his fist raised and ready to strike. 

Vergil's face flattened into a displeased line. "I found a dress pattern. But I need to make sure the sizing is suitable for her." 

Nero pulled back and scratched at his nose sheepishly. "Oh." 

"Well?" Vergil held up the thin onion-skin-like paper for his son's perusal. 

The basic outline for an a-line dress laid out in front of him, Nero still couldn't comprehend most of the symbols and numbering. He held it up and studied the relative size of it; not accounting for the lack of limbs attached to it, it certainly seemed like it was close to Kyrie's relative height. It floated above a ream of flowery fabric he had been eyeing, it too, seeming like enough to his untrained eye. Bathed in creamy beige with some pink and red rose patterning, he could already tell it would float right up Kyrie's aisle. 

"Yeah," Nero breathed out deeply, all the tension in his shoulders leaving as the picture took shape in his mind's eye, "yeah, I think this'll work." 

Vergil nodded, took both tools from him, and set them up to begin. It seemed like a bit of cheating, as he expertly cut the shapes free from the fabric with nothing but a single twitch of his hands and a flash of blue light. But Nero wasn't about to complain as he read the pattern's instructions and found exactly how many steps accounted for cutting. It wouldn't matter much as long as sewing them together remained half a mystery to him. 

"Make sure you don't start against the grain," Vergil warned, pulling the fabric away from the machine. 

Nero frowned and pulled it back. "What grain?" 

"The lengthwise direction of the threading." 

Father and son drew their heads together to stare at the smallest angles of threads, straining even their demonic eyes. 

"You can't even see it!" Nero snapped. 

Vergil sighed. They had a long way to go. 

* * *

If he was completely honestly with himself, Nero hadn't been this nervous since he first asked if Kyrie would accept him. As a demon, as a boyfriend, as a professional demon hunter who could barely help pay the bills. But just like then, she just had her way of lighting up and whisking all those doubts and fears away. 

Her face upon sight of exactly what he had handed her was something new, however. She wasn't often surprised—she always just _knew_ stuff, and Nero suspected it was a family trait she shared with Credo at this point—but the widening of her eyes and mouth when he mentioned that it was handmade by himself, well... 

He probably should have felt a little ashamed, still, that the thought of him _making_ anything could surprise her so much. 

"A new dress!" she gaped and held the garment to her chest, draping down and covering her frame near-perfectly. "Thank you so much!" 

Nero scratched his nose and pointed behind himself, where a shadowy man sat alone and out of the way. "Dad helped." 

"Thank you, too, Vergil," she smiled even wider. 

The man nodded and remained still. Though Nero could swear he could also see that his father held his chin slightly higher and raised his brows out of their persistent crinkles. 

"Maybe one of you could help me with a few more projects, now," Kyrie brightened up with that oh-so-beautiful smile of hers. 

Vergil looked startled, but hid it quickly with a quick fold of his arms and straightening of his posture. Nero rolled his eyes all the way over, smacking a fond arm around his father's dense shoulders. 

" _We_ would be happy to." 

**Author's Note:**

> Vergil: sewing is a skilled art many underestimate too much  
> also Vergil: [judgement cuts fabric]
> 
> so pre-covid, i was actually taking sewing classes! and my teacher did mention that the easiest way to start is by fixing something you use/need a lot, which for me was a blanket, so of course for Nero, it would be his jacket, right? i had a much easier time than our boy did, but I'm very artsy-inclined while he just.... isn't. but where Nero may lack an eye for detail, his dad sure doesn't! and I of course couldn't resist the trope of giving Vergil a soft hobby, but I was pretty sure nobody else had taken a shot at sewing yet, so this is mine :)
> 
> The terms are 100% real btw, though I definitely didn't give full context to most of them lol. And this isn't specifically tied to the devil's got my arms or my previous dadgil week one-shot, but if you wanna read it that way, that's fine! reminding myself of context and excessive detail makes me write a lot slower anyway, and i'm trying to get myself used to more short n sweet stuff
> 
> thanks for reading, and check out [tdgma](https://archiveofourown.org/works/21784648/chapters/51981415) for more lengthy and angsty attempts at dadgil! :D


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